


Jealous

by CameraObscura



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-07
Updated: 2018-05-10
Packaged: 2019-05-03 08:26:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14565018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CameraObscura/pseuds/CameraObscura
Summary: So, this story assumes the big “come after me” scene probably didn’t happen in the same way. They’re both regretting not being bolder. It’s been longer than Jack expected for Phryne to return. One night he writes a letter confessing his feelings.





	1. In His Cups

**Author's Note:**

> “Jealous” by Labrinth inspired the titled. It’s such a heartbreaking and beautiful song, you should find it.

The crowd at the bar was loud and scream-singing a Footie anthem. Jack slapped the back of his co-worker and wished him a happy retirement. After a very good bottle of scotch was gifted, Jack returned to the office to grab the tin of biscuits Dot had left for him. He had a rare two days off and planned to do some maintenance on his bike and deadhead his garden, but tonight he would get drunk and sleep it off tomorrow. Lately he’d been drinking a lot. He didn’t really care. He functioned perfectly at his job, he just needed something to distract from all these feelings. Jesus Christ, these feelings. 

Looking at the clock and realizing he couldn’t buy another bottle of liquor until tomorrow, he remembered the spare bottle he kept in the back of his bottom desk drawer. Tucked behind the bottle were Phryne’s arrest photos when she charmingly thumbed her nose at constabulary authority. His fingers brushed them, exhaled out all the wind from his lungs and grabbed both bottle and pictures in front of him. After staring at the face for a while, he grabbed pen and paper.

Stuffing an envelope with the letter, Jack left it in the out-going mail bin. He went home with a mind unburdened by regret, optimistic for the first time in months.


	2. The Letter

Phryne woke up with a very dry mouth, a throbbing in her temples, and an uncomfortable weight in the form of an arm draped on her stomach. She took a moment to take stock. Right, Harrington Chester-Brooks. Ugh. Why? Gifted in lovemaking he may be, but he’s also loathsome. And too...too. She didn’t bother to put words to it. Had she, she would have said he was too empty headed and his humor off putting, not at all like Jack’s intelligent dry humor. Phryne just wanted him gone. Since leaving Melbourne, this was the third dalliance that ended with feelings of regret. “Darling Harry, it’s time to wake up. We don’t want to scandalize the staff.”

After Harry was gone, Phryne accepted her breakfast tray and the morning’s post. Most were invitations to society events, a few charitable requests, but the last one had Australian stamps and she excitedly dropped the others. The front of the envelope was addressed in Jack’s handwriting and her heart fluttered. She slid the cool, gleaming blade of the silver envelope opener under the flap with more care than she otherwise would. She wanted to preserve the envelope and savor the reading. Phryne lifted the crisply folded sheet to her nose. She remembered more than smelled Jack’s sandalwood soap. She thought back to the time she flipped his collar to tie his tie after using it to demonstrate thief knots. In that moment, when the warm fragrance hit her, Phryne had felt her body pulled to him; and had they not been interrupted, she was sure it would have ended in a kiss. She would have tried anyway.

_Dear Miss Fisher,_

_I find myself quite cast down at your absence. I’ve tried finding distractions, work used to be quite diverting until I met a charming freight train in Lydia Andrew’s powder room. Now, I hear “Hello, Jack!” in your voice in my head at every crime scene. I’ve taken to nightly visits to the gymnasium in the hopes of working off this melancholy. Apparently, it has only added to my “lean hungry look,” you once described and as such Dot now sends weekly baskets of Mr. Butler’s au gratin and biscuits. As much as it is appreciated, you really must inform your staff not to trouble themselves._

Phryne smiled appreciating how Dot and Mr. Butler took care of Jack. Then she pictured her buttoned up Inspector exerted, muscles bunched. It was an arousing image, one she would be revisiting.

_As a thanks, I’ve sent over some plants from my garden. One is a stunning red peony (Paeonia lactiflora), which needed more space for its roots. Its blooms are a shock to the senses and remind me of your painted lips. Its perfume clings to the air much like yours did that night on the pier when you promised “to wear less next time.” Always teasing. God, how I now wish I’d acted on your teasing. Even once. If only I’d accepted your invitation to a gaudy night or braved that lethal dress to find out what lies beneath, I would have memory as companion instead of fantasy._

“Me too, Jack. Me too.” Phryne said to herself.

_Earlier tonight, I attended a retirement party for Bates. I must admit, I’m entirely drunk._

She giggled. Jack was adorable tipsy. He would loosen his tie revealing the base of his throat that was entirely distracting and make wickedly funny double entendres. His smile was larger than at any other time, making him look younger.

_But now, in your absence and in my cups, I want to tell you everything I wasn’t bold enough to say._

“Sounds serious,” she answered the paper.  
  
_In your presence I am often overwhelmed. I burn with a passion for you, so engulfing, it renders me speechless. I sent you off in that damn plane with my blessing and I meant it; I never want you locked in a cage, but I thought you’d get to London and choose to return home to us. Instead, months later, I’m jealous of the London rain that gets to kiss your cheeks, the wind playing in your hair, satin party dresses touching your skin, and men in damned cravats. I understand jealously seems an unattractive quality to you, but it’s how I feel._

_We’ve spoken through pregnant pauses and meaningful glances, the time has come for clarity. I want you in my now and my future - for as long as you’ll have me. I want to be enough for you._

_Come home, Phryne. Choose me, freely and completely, as I have chosen you. Let me love you and we’ll come together as one, intertwine our bodies where we can’t distinguish where I end and you begin. I want to pebble your peaks and plunder your depths in worship until the only name on your tongue is mine. And you shall speak it like a mantra._

_Ever yours,_  
_J_

The letter left her flushed and excited. She was truly shocked by his candor and it took a lot to shock Phryne Fisher. It gladdened her heart that the crack in the dam of Jack’s careful reserve had broken. Finally. She only wished it hadn’t taken her crossing the globe to make it so.

Phryne took inventory of her feelings. She could not say when attraction had turned to more with Jack, it seemed to have come on quite gradual. She recognized it was indeed love and the enduring kind at that. That is, no doubt, why taking Harry to bed had felt wrong. Lately, with other men, her body worked on muscle memory, but the mind was elsewhere. On Jack.

Jack possessed equal parts intelligence and physical attraction, but more importantly, he connected to her spirit. It was a thing a wonder, their yin and yang. Accepting his love would be in the hopes of forever. Could she commit to one man? She regarded the men with whom she shared her bed. Not one of those men was worthy of her love. Affection. Yes. She came quite close to loving Lin, but she held herself back. Did her heart know what her head did not, that she had to stay available for Jack because they were meant to be together? Did she believe in fated lovers? Surely not. Right? 

Jack could offer what no other relationship could. Autonomy. Challenge. Safety. Chemistry. She was honest to admit that sexual pleasure was a necessity and would need testing, but she was confident that they would be evenly matched. His letter showed promise. _Plunder my depths? Good God! Those are the words of a passionate man._

She rushed to ready herself in order to send a telegram.

J, YOU ARE MY HOME STOP WAIT FOR ME HPF


	3. The Diary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phryne sails home to Jack.

Lacking confidence her plane could make the return trip safely and feeling less eager to attempt the brutal distance alone, Phryne opted to sail home to Melbourne. And to Jack. The journey was irritatingly slow. The rhythm of waves kept time like a dysfunctional metronome, sometimes staccato, which had Phryne feeling unwell and put her off dinner, sometimes gentle, lulling her into feverish dreams.

_Jack stood over her sitting audaciously in his desk chair. “Give me the file, Miss Fisher!” His voice was firm and deep. The notes causing a quickening in her stomach._

_“What? These?”_

_“This isn’t a game.”_

_“Oh! I quite think it is. This is a game and I am teaching you the rules.” She stood up, making herself tall with challenge and mischief in her eyes. She held the file behind her back._

_“Is that so?” He reached his arm behind her toward the file, their bodies connected. He looked down at her parted lips._

_“It is.”_

_“How do I play?”_

_“Well, first you must prove you’re equally matched to your opponent.”_

_“Like this?” He pressed into her hips._

_“Yes. Yes, very good. And then you use your cunning to dominate.”_

_“Like this?” He grabbed her by the waist, spun her around, and lifted her on to the desk. He stepped between her legs, grabbed the back of her head and kissed all the reason out of her. Jack’s hands slowly reached..._

_Gong. Gong. Gong. Gong._

A blasted bell was ringing somewhere outside her cabin’s porthole pulling Phryne awake, thus ending the glorious dream. Of course.

Phryne felt a frustration building in her core with each day that passed. Often she fantasized about Jack in the gymnasium wearing a white singlet, his body in a plank, lowering down and raising up with graceful control. Although completely imagined, she revisited it daily. Often rubbing her most delicate parts like a worry stone, efficiently bringing herself to climax, but it failed to sate. Her fingers, delightful as they were, could not replace a man. She craved the stretch, desired weight pressing on her body. In short, she wanted to fuck.

There were many handsome men on board the ship, a few intellectuals, a couple sophisticates, and a rogue Lathario who pressed rather closely during after-dinner dancing. Two months ago, she would have taken Lothario back to her cabin and asked permission to climb aboard the SS Hanky Panky. But that was another time, indeed it felt like another Phryne. She found herself retiring early to her cabin very much alone with only a dog-eared copy of DH Lawrence for company.

On those nights, when she could still feel the ghosted memory of her dance partner’s roving hands, she took to writing thoughts in a brand-new diary acquired for the journey. The first page was filled with an account of when they met and her first impressions of Jack. _Stern. Jawline made me feel deliciously naughty. I wanted to be your bad girl and have you spank me._  
  
She filled the diary page after page recording their banter, ranking her fantasies of Jack (# 1 involving an alcove, an accent, and a creatively applied feather), favorite music she wanted to dance to, ideas for lethal dresses he might like, books she wanted to share, places they should visit, operettas they would sneak out at intermission, and the countless things she wished to discover about him.

What began as a channel for Phryne’s more amorous urges became a tool of self-discovery.  
A tiny ship cabin and no one on board with whom she cared to mingle forced her to sit with thoughts she had successfully avoided for years through all manner of distractions. She recognized René alone deserved blame for his abuse. Grown-up Phryne granted herself a pardon. Yes, it was true she had taken a horrible experience and transformed it into strength, but she had been harboring a bit of disgust for Younger Phryne.Through self-discovery, Phryne began to feel she actually deserved Jack. He wasn’t too good for her or in danger of being sullied. Excitement to begin this new Jack chapter grew the closer they sailed to shore.

Only one spread remained empty the day before she was to debark in Melbourne. She wrote:

_Jack, I’m writing this from my cabin as I sail home to you. In a little more than 24-hours we will be reunited after almost a year. We once questioned how a marriage could survive five-years and a war. How have I managed a year without you, my partner? At great difficulty, I assure you. The World has enjoyed peace and prosperity, which I hope portents good things to come. You have forever altered me. I want to be worthy of you, brave in the shadows for you. I will certainly try. That’s a promise._

_-P_


	4. Reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The reunion! Phryne is delivered to the shores of Jack’s heart and they do stuff. Sex stuff. And talk...in a manner of speaking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I suddenly because hyper aware of my tenses, wanting to be consistent through the text even if I hadn’t been in previous chapters. Red pen away, darlings.

“Miss Fisher! Welcome back to the antipodes.” Jack’s warm eyes and grin light up his entire face.

“Jack!” Phryne drops her satchel at her feet and almost skips the short distance to where he stands feeling more happy than could ever remember. “I choose you.”

“What did you say?”

“I choose you!”

Jack reaches for her hand and swiftly pulls her into his arms, his tight embrace all-encompassing. Phryne melts at his touch. Jack holds her hair, whispering in her ear, “Miss Fisher. Oh, Miss Fisher! I have missed you!”

“Me too. That letter. Jack, your letter completely undid me. I’m sorry I’m so late to our...dance. Is it too late?”

“Never. I really should have asked you sooner.”

The emotion of the moment hits them both. She pulls away only far enough to hold his face in her hands, taking in the sight. The same face she memorized looks back unchanged by time, hair still precisely groomed, jawline freshly shaven. The only difference being his slightly more casual attire. He steps back, scans her up and down, finds Phryne whole, all limbs accounted for, safe and sound on terra firma. Finally. Thank God. He lets out the breath he felt he’d been holding this year solid.

“You’re home. You’re really here.” Becoming aware of their surroundings and to the public display they were causing he lets her go saying, “You must be exhausted. I can drive you home, or, if you’re hungry, we can lunch in my garden. I baked bread this morning.”

“How delightful!”  
  
He picks up the satchel and offers Phryne his arm. Perhaps it’s being deprived of solid ground for so long causing the sensation in her legs, but she rather believes it’s Jack’s steadying nature, so long absent now back at her side. Depositing her into the passenger side and shutting her door, he takes the longer walk around to the driver’s side to steady his breathing. In the front seat, they lock eyes. While still very visible through the car windows, they feel the intimacy of the car’s cab creating a space separate from the outside. The gardenia of her perfume, never forgotten, fills his senses and floods him with a heady nostalgia. Jack almost wishes they were in her Hispano-Suiza breaking speed limits, so they could arrive at his house as quickly as possible. He needs to touch this woman. Properly. Phryne in her own private moment smells Jack’s sandalwood soap. _Love smells like sandalwood. I am the kind of woman in love who makes platitudes._

Jack pulls up to his bungalow. As he cranks the hand break, he turns to her. Sunlight bounces off the metal from a neighbor’s garage roof through the windshield casting a gorgeous ray across one eye and his heart bursts at her beauty. _If I were a painter I would paint her in this light._ He smiles at the thought, though whether out of personal embarrassment or worthiness of the subject he couldn’t say.

“What are you smiling at?”

“I was just thinking that if I could paint I would capture you in this light. Forgive me, Miss Fisher. You find me made ridiculous by your arrival.”

Phryne is struck by this romantic side of Jack which he hid so long, but she intuited was there. She smiles with her eyes closed, slightly shakes her head, as if Jack were a potent tonic in danger of intoxicating. She is feeling for the edges of her emotional landscape, but the boundary stretches out. Her voice is soft and whispery, communicating desire for more than Jack’s baking, “Shall we head inside?”

They hold hands as he leads her up the stairs of his home. She couldn’t have known that he spent 10 hours the previous weekend repainting his already perfectly maintained porch just because, house proud and expecting a visit from her, he wanted to impress. She also couldn’t have known he spent the previous evening proofing bread dough just on the chance she would want to eat at his place.

Phryne stills when she enters his home feeling like he was opening the last of a series of nesting boxes. _This is it. He is sharing his life with me and I am ready. More than ready, in fact._ He closes and remains leaning against the door. She feels his eyes, turns to look at him. Leaning. Always leaning. How can a lean be so sexy? But this time with a look in his eyes she’s never seen before. It draws her in. The distance between them like a burning wick leading to the inevitable explosion. He pushes off the door and they collide in passion.

His kisses communicate all the joy at seeing her and all the pain her absence caused. Her kisses grant permission to explore her body for all the pleasures it has to offer and Jacks revels in the freedom. His hands are in her hair, on her face, around the small of her back, pulling her white silk blouse up, seeking her breasts. Jack’s touches are everywhere she wants, but she senses he’s still holding back. Her need building, Phryne’s soft panting encourages him to let go of the last of his gentlemanly restraint. Jack backs her up against the wall, his erection pressing on her thigh. He looks down his lashes at Phryne’s open face, lips swollen, her alabaster skin flushed, trying to work out if he’s the kind of man who would fuck Phryne Fisher up against the wall.

“Jack, I need you. Right now.” Phryne unfastens her skirt, dropping it in a puddle.

In turns out, Jack is not the kind of man who would fuck Phryne Fisher up against a wall. That is not until she well and truly comes first from his mouth. He drops to his knees, his hands kneading her ass. Only her silk tap pants between his nose and her mound cause an exhilaration inside. Phryne drapes a leg wantonly over Jack’s shoulder. He grabs the waist band, bringing her tap pants down achingly slow. His hand covers her mound and his finger dips in.

“For fuck’s sake, Phryne. You are so wet.”

A sharp intake of air at the filthiness of his words, “Jack, I’ve never heard you swear before!” She wiggles at the desire it stirred.

“And I’ve never had my face between your legs, Miss Fisher.”

He kisses her deeply and enthusiastically lapping her up in a way that threatens to push her over the edge. Long fingers slip inside, first two and then a third. He takes his mouth away letting his hand establish a steady rhythm, the heel of his hand pounding her nub, his fingers rubbing her internal walls. She comes with a loud cry and he grabs her waist to steady her from toppling over. Jack stands, kisses her forehead, and leads her to the bedroom shedding his jumper on the way.

“Well, Jack Robinson, you’re quite good, you know? That was a quite a performance,” Phryne says with a squint of her upward eyes and a pout of the lips.

“Thank you, I learned in the Academy,” unbuttoning his shirt, then laughs at his own teasing, and reaches for her.

Embracing, Phryne turned serious. “I am very glad you wrote me that letter.”

“I am very glad you sent that telegram.”

“Take off this shirt. When did you know you loved me?”

“Almost immediately. Get on the bed.” Doing what she’s told, just this once, she reclines on the bed. She lies on her belly, legs bent at the knee, ankles crossed demurely watching Jack from her face in her hands. “Why did you choose me?”

“Because you are exceptional. Get out of these pants.” She is gobsmacked by the specimen standing in front of her. “Why do you love me?” She rolls to her back presenting as her most feline self.

“Because I tried and I couldn’t help it. Every single thing about you demands my utter devotion. Touch your breasts. What do you want from us?”

Stroking her breasts, “Just as you said, I want you in my now and my future, for as long as you’ll have me.” Then moving to her knees, “Put your cock in my mouth. What are you scared of.”

“At the moment? That if I put my cock in your mouth this will all end embarrassingly quickly.”

“Noted. What are you scared of?”

“That I won’t be enough for Phryne Fisher. Touch yourself. What are you scared of?”

Phryne spreads her legs wide, one hand on her breasts, one circles her clitoris and says, “That you’ll put up walls to keep me out. Kiss me.” He climbs on top taking her mouth hungrily, his weight on her satisfies. “Did we just have the most direct conversation of our whole acquaintance during foreplay?

“Yes. Kiss me.” Phryne obliges. “What do you want,” Jack asks?

“You, Jack. All of you. Just give me you.” Jack slips inside


End file.
